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April 30, 2007

When Kathy* announced that she wanted to come to Lexington (Kentucky) to visit Karen* in April, my first thought was… “Isn’t the Yarn Harlot going to Lexington for something?" Then I pointed out to them that the Bluegrass Festival of Books was going to be in Lexington on April 21st. Later, I mentioned that there was “this author” who writes “knitting books” that I might be interested in seeing at the festival. Subtle, eh? Karen ended up getting called out of town at the last minute (for all day on Saturday), but Kathy, Tim, & I still converged on her house for a fun weekend in Lexington.

None of us had been to a book festival before, so it was all a little confusing when we arrived at the festival on Saturday morning. Once we figured out where to go, we headed off to get my copy of Stephanie Pearl-McPhee Casts Off signed. Kathy & Tim (referred to as the muggles from this point forward) followed, the three of us dodging the hordes of little girls dressed in costumes matching their dolls lined up for the American Girl teas and the hordes of adult women queued up to have lunch with Paula Deen. Surreal is possibly a word that could be applied to this whole scene – knitters weren’t the only subculture represented at this book fair :)

The muggles even hung out in the book signing line with me, both of them making cracks about knitting and knitting humor books while we waited. As I was getting my book signed, the owner of a local knitting store (Magpie Yarn, no website) pointed out that there was a knitting author panel about to start, featuring Stefanie Japel (Glampyre, Fitted Knits), Susan Anderson (Itty Bitty Hats), and Ann Hood (The Knitting Circle). The panel was great! Both the muggles came along as well, and seemed to enjoy it.

We took a break from the book festival to run out and get some lunch (oh, and to stop at Magpie Yarns, LOL). Then we headed back to go to the Yarn Harlot’s talk. I wasn’t expecting the muggles to hang out with me during the talk or anything, I thought there’d be plenty of activities of interest to these particular muggles going on at the same time. Turns out, there really weren’t any other talks at the same time for them so they came along.

Kathy & I at the Yarn Harlot's talk

I think it was an interesting experience for both of them. They went in making a little bit of fun of the whole knitting thing and they both seemed to gain a new respect for it by the end. So, this is my lesson for the day: get your muggles involved in your knitting activities, they might actually really learn how to appreciate your knitting!

Other random things from Lexington:
1. Kathy, Karen, and I went to Keeneland, Lexington’s horse racing course, on Sunday afternoon for a couple of hours. Although it ended up costing me $20 (I apparently stink at betting on the ponies), it was a lot of fun. Quite an interesting scene.

This is the center of the racetrack, there's a large information board there where they show a feed of the race and who is winning.

ps Betting on a particular horse just because they have a cool name or are “pretty” is not a good way to make money at the track, but it makes the whole thing more fun.

2. The stretch of interstate 65 between Bowling Green and Elizabethtown (where you turn to head east on the Bluegrass Parkway) is some kind of freaky time warp. I swear this section of the trip takes 3-4 times longer than it should according to the miles. It’s bizarre. There is, however, a really good Dairy Queen not far from Elizabethtown that makes the never ending trip a little better. We've had this strange thing for DQ ever since we lived in Texas - where the DQ slogan (on billboards) is a picture of the Dairy Queen sign with the phrase "Texas Stop Sign". I think it's one of the most effective marketing slogans ever.

3. Lexington makes Nashville look like a fast-paced crazy large metropolis. That’s not to say that Lexington is bad (on the contrary, I really like Lexington), but it’s one of those places that almost demand that you kick back and take it easy.

4. When you start calling people muggles assuming they've read Harry Potter (since everyone has), they might be a bit clueless if they actually haven't read Harry Potter. Or seen any of the movies. I was stunned when both Kathy & Karen said they haven't read the books or seen the movies at all. Shocking! We remedied this by buying Kathy the first Harry Potter audiobook to listen to on her drive back up to Wisconsin. Glad to report she's halfway through it and is really enjoying it.

*Kathy and Karen are my older sisters. And yes, it is on purpose that all our names start with K. Our other sister's name is Karla. My brothers' names all start with G. No explanation for it, that's just the way things are.

April 27, 2007

Today, I've got a very similar feeling to when I walked out of a movie theater before the movie ended for the first time** because I'm walking out on a knitting project that just isn't going to work out for me. I've never started knitting something and just given up before. Sometimes I take a break from a project, but I always eventually go back and finish.

The worst part of this? I've been defeated by a turtle. Seriously. A turtle. Stuffed animal. Small. Easy to knit. Specifically Sheldon the Turtle from knitty.

I want to be clear in saying that I think the pattern is totally fine - it really was an easy knit. In fact, I had finished knitting every piece except for one. I love the way the finished Sheldon's look when I see pictures on flickr. They're so darn cute! The fault lies not with Sheldon, but rather with me.

Last night, when I reached into one of the UFO boxes and pulled out the baggie containing the Sheldon pieces, all I really needed to do was assemble the bits. Then everything went wobbly. I started putting things together (they even fit together properly!) and decided there was No Way I was going to finish. I decided I didn't like the colors (orange and blue), I didn't like the yarn (Berroco Touche), and most of all, I didn't like all the little bits. On top of that, this was intended as a gift for a friend who had twins, so I was going to have to do all the finishing steps twice. Thinking about that made me a bit queesy.

I bundled it all up in a plastic baggie and, after this weekend, it's going into the eternal resting place for knits that just don't work out (ie my friend Mr Trash Bin). I'm giving it the weekend in case I spontaneously develop amnesia about last night and suddenly decide I want to give it a go again. I would frog it and try to re-purpose the yarn, but a) I hate the yarn and b) with all the little bits comprising Sheldon, I'd end up with 80 tiny pieces of yarn about 6" long each.

I'm also adding a little note in the "Kim's Personal Knitting Rules" folder in my head: "Do not knit anything comprised of multiple tiny pieces that will later need to be sewn together because it will drive you mad and result in a wasted night of knitting effort. Then you will feel compelled to stay up until midnight working on socks to make it feel like you didn't waste your whole evening, you will get too little sleep, and will then wake up grumpy the next morning even if it is a Friday."

On the positive side, the yarn was cheap and it didn't require too much (even for two Sheldons), so it's not a huge loss. On the negative side I now have to think of a baby gift for twins that were born, um, a while ago.

**If you're wondering, the movie was The Cell with Jennifer Lopez. We went because Roger Ebert said it was an awesome movie. I don't think I've ever disliked a movie that much. I actually felt ill afterwards.

April 26, 2007

You know, where you start with a skein of yarn and end up with a swatch, but can't remember winding the ball or knitting the swatch? Yeah, right - that's never happened to you. Just go buy some mmmmmmalabrigo and you can see what I mean.

Or, get some Socks That Rock Silkie. Yes, that's right - Silkie, a new STR yarn in a blend of superwash and silk. April's STR kit arrived today. I remember opening the package. I know that I've got a swatch blocking right now. I don't remember the in-between steps because the yarn is so darn pretty. And soft, did I mention soft?

As mixed as my feelings were about the first STR kit, I'm in love with this one - I love the yarn and I also think the pattern will be fun. The pattern is another toe-up sock (knit on 2 circs this time - but I'll probably still do DPNs), but this month it's more of a lacey stocking with calf shaping. Looks like it should be fun to knit.

Wanna see a picture?

ps to everybody from Tuesday night knitting - don't worry, I'll bring this along next week. But you'll have to sit down if you want to touch the swatch, it could make you light headed :)

April 25, 2007

The TECHknitting blog is starting a series on colorwork, so if you're interested in learning some tips and hints on colorwork, head on over there. The first post gives a lot of basic background information. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series. If you've never heard of the TECHknitting blog, she posts some great knitting technique tips. I love the style of the illustrations she uses as well, very fun.

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In other news, the Japanese maple in our backyard is actually getting new leaves! Not as many as it had this spring and there's definitely some damage on some of the outer branches, but this is still better than I was expecting.

And our irises have started blooming! (Er, have I mentioned that I have this thing for spring flowers? It's really a bit of an obsession.)

The first spring after we planted irises, we had all these great leaves, but zero flowers - not a single one. Then we learned the secret of planting irises (at least in this area). You basically don't plant them at all, you have to leave them practically sitting on top of the dirt, barely covered. And there's my helpful tip for the day :)

April 24, 2007

We were up at the Bluegrass Festival of Books in Lexington (where my sister Karen lives) this weekend. I'll write a lot more about it soon and about going to a Yarn Harlot talk with muggles in tow. I'm a bit under the weather today, so this is just a quick post to recommend one of the books that I purchased at the book fair.

To be honest, I wasn't really planning on buying The Knitting Circle by Ann Hood. Yes, I love knitting but novels about knitting? That seems a bit obsessive. We arrived at the book festival just in time to listen to a panel of knitting authors. I think it was basically an "all the knitting authors at the festival except the Yarn Harlot" panel. In addition to Ann Hood, there was also Susan Anderson of Itty-Bitty Hats (which I also bought) and Stefanie Japel (aka Glampyre) of Fitted Knits. The mix of pattern authors with a novelist resulted in an interesting discussion and I started thinking The Knitting Circle might be an interesting read.

The Knitting Circle is about Mary, whose 5 year old daughter dies unexpectedly. After her mother suggests that she go to a knitting class (mainly to distract her from her grief, I think), she ends up joining a knitting circle. The book tells the story of each of the members of the circle, why they took up knitting, and the role that knitting played in their lives.

Overall, I highly recommend this book. It's very well written and I honestly couldn't set it down. The fact that I've finished the book (when I just started reading it on Saturday night) is both because I had lots of time to read since I wasn't feeling well but more importantly because I felt compelled to keep reading to find out what happened to each of these people. I wouldn't really classify this book as "knitting fiction", it's just plain old good fiction. I don't think you need to be a knitter to find this book very satisfying. It does have quite a few sad moments, but there's certainly a sense of hope and also many happy things that happen as well.

April 19, 2007

After a week of reasonable temperatures, I decided it was time to start assessing damage from last week's big late spring freeze. It's not pretty, but there are some positive things.

Here's the worst - the Japanese maple in our backyard.

It doesn't seem that bad from the picture, but here's what happens when you touch the leaves...

They're basically just little crispy pieces of dead leaves. There was an article in the gardening section of the paper this weekend - no one really knows what is going to happen to the trees and bushes that got hit this badly. The branches seem to be fine, but is it going to put out new leaves? No way to know at this point.

Both fig trees are the same way - leaves all dead, the early figs all goners. A few of our other trees and bushes suffered some damage, but nothing as bad as the figs and Japanese maple.

On the other hand, there are some positive signs. All the extra time spent covering our strawberries paid off. They made it through with no problems - lots of flowers plus plenty of berries already started. And then yesterday, I saw this...

So the asparagus made it through too! And all of our daylillies and peonies seem fine. Still waiting to see if our irises are going to bloom or not.

The biggest positive of the entire bad gardening situation is that our seed order was delayed, so we didn't actually have any seeds planted. The day after the last freezing night, our pepper seedlings arrived from Seeds of Change.

There are a few things we have problems getting started - peppers are one of them. Plus, by ordering this seedling set, we get a variety of different sweet peppers.

Now, we're all ready to get started with the garden and get everything planted! Keeping our fingers crossed that everything recovers from this crazy spring weather!

April 18, 2007

Photographing socks is a hit-or-miss operation for me. Some socks look great in pictures, others just look plain ol' bad. Case in point: the "Inside-Out" sock from the Blue Moon Rockin' Sock Club.

Here's a picture of my first finished sock:

I swear, it looks better than this in real life.

You might recall, I originally said "NO WAY!" to this sock pattern and started off with a fairly simple waffle weave pattern from Sensational Knitted Socks. When I was basically done with the sock, I realized that I hated how it looked and frogged the whole thing. I saw a completed set of the kit pattern socks in real life and started thinking about making them with some mods. Then, suddenly, I had cast on and was halfway done :)

My mods
1. Instead of using #0 or #00 needles as the pattern called for, I just cast on fewer stitches (54). Then I added stitches once I got to the leg portion to make the cable section larger. Kim's Basic Rules of Knitting Rule 4: Kim doesn't knit with #00 needles, ever.
2. I did a regular stockinette slip-stitch toe and heel rather than the garter stitch version called for in the pattern. I just didn't like how the garter stitch version looked. I guess this means the socks are reversible, but I'm cool with that.
3. I started with #1 needles and used them through the foot and the first cable repeat on the leg. Then I switched to #2 needles.
4. I used the EZ sewn bind off. No particular bind off was specified in the instructions.

I'm not thrilled with how this sock turned out, but it does fit like a dream. I would never ever have tried a ribbed sole of a sock, it seemed odd. Turns out, a ribbed sole is super comfortable. The sock just hugs my foot. I think that the problem with knitting into the front and back of each stitch on the round before binding off was that I already had extra stitches (to account for the cables pulling everything together) and more extra stitches weren't needed. Not sure how I could have figured that out before I did it though :)

I don't think this pattern is the best choice for this colorway. One of the other sock club members (Illiana) knit these socks with a lighter Blue Moon colorway and the cables reall POP on her version. I think the pattern just gets drowned in the dark Monsoon colorway. I would probably knit these again (with my mods) in a lighter colorway if I had it to do over.

Will I finish the second sock? Probably, but I might need a break for a while. On the other hand, they were a really fast knit, so I might just go ahead and get them done.

April 17, 2007

I feel like this must be a joke - but it's not! I finally finished my first Socks That Rock sock last night and bound off right before going to bed. It fits like a dream! My modifications really turned out well, except for one thing. Before binding off, I knit in to the front and back of each stitch. This worked really well on the Oktoberfest toe-up sock - it made it fit perfectly. In this case though, what I now have is a big giant floppy top that doesn't even touch my leg. It just balloons out and hangs around. ARGH!!! Other than that, I'm really loving the sock but apparently I've got a bit more work to do to fix the top section :)

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I can't go to knitting tonight because we have our neighborhood book club. This month, we're reading Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. I haven't actually finished the book (which isn't that unusual for our book club) but it's written so well that I'm definitely going to finish it even after our meeting.

April 16, 2007

I should probably just sit down and stick with one project at a time, but every time I try to do that, something else calls my name. Case in point: socks.

I've been slogging away at the Oktoberfest socks for what seems like (and probably is) months. I was worried after the experience with the first sock, I wouldn't manage to ever get going on the second sock. To get around this, I cast on for the second sock right away. And then let it sit there on the needles forever :) Hm. I might have even gone out and bought yet another pair of #1 needles so I could cast on a new sock. I finally managed to turn the heel on the second sock this weekend, so we're making some forward progress!

The other sock that has been hanging about is my Socks That Rock kit sock. I wasn't fond of the sock pattern that came with the kit (especially when I heard that some people were having a hard time getting it on once they finished), so I cast on an alternative. I was almost finished with the first sock when I decided I really didn't like it. I probably should have just set it aside for a while, but before I could really think it through, it was frogged! Right thing to do, but still... Then I decided I would make the kit sock pattern but make some major alterations. I turned the heel on the first sock this weekend (it was a heel turning kind of weekend!) but now I'm pondering what alterations I want to make as I move forward.

What I really want to do most of all is to cast on some socks using this yarn I picked up from an etsy shop, Sunshine Yarns:

The colorway is called Hedwig (after Harry Potter's owl), and I love love love it. I'm going to hold off on casting on until I finish one of those other socks though - maybe it will give me motivation to finish quickly!

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I also made a lot of progress this weekend on my mmmmmalabrigo lace shawl. I decided after much contemplation to start off on the whole lace shawls thing with something relatively easy - Icarus from Interweave Knits Summer 2006. Mim sells a copy on her website if you don't have that issue (and lots of good pictures of it there too). The top part of the shawl has a relatively simple repeated pattern. Once you've done a bunch of rows, it's easy to remember.

The mmmmalabrigo looks gorgeous in this pattern (so far). The color variation of the yarn really makes the top portion of the shawl, which is relatively plain, really pop. No pictures yet - I promise to take some soon.

I'm listening to the Harry Potter books on tape (checked on from the library) while working on the lace. I learned a good lesson early on in the pattern - I can't really watch DVDs while I'm doing yarn overs.
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Speaking of projects to juggle, I just received some yarn today that I bought on ebay: 13 skeins of Noro Silk Garden. To make? The Lady Eleanor Yarn from Scarf Style. I got a great deal on the yarn AND more importantly, I know I like the colorway (touch and go with the Noro, no?) because I've seen it knitted up in the shawl on the Fig and Plum blog. When I was thinking about making the pattern, I searched around on the internet a bit to see what people had to say about the Noro Silk Garden Yarn. My Noro experience is decidedly limited so I wasn't sure about the yarn and I haven't done a lot of entrelac so I wasn't sure about the pattern either. I'm thinking this is going to make a good travel project. Before the big Australia trip in August, I'm going to San Francisco for a conference in late June. That's a lot of flying (and waiting in airports) time so I'm hoping to get a lot of knitting done in the process.

April 12, 2007

I took some mental health vacation time Wednesday after a stressful day Tuesday and an incredibly unproductive morning as a result. It was a rainy and blah afternoon, so I was thinking about just curling up with a good book and some tea. This is what the view looked like out the back door:

I decided some crafting would cheer me up more than hanging around being morose. I've been meaning for months (literally) to get going on some sewing projects from In Stitches by Amy Butler. I love her fabrics and I've made a few of her purse patterns. In Stitches has a little over 20 patterns, divided into the rooms/areas where projects can be used. The first pattern that drew my attention was the Short Pleated Apron pattern.

I always lose track in sewing of the fact that a lot of the time involved is in the fabric cutting process. This pattern was relatively easy because all of the pieces were rectangles, making for easy and fast cutting. I ran out of my contrast fabric, but it was okay - I had plenty of the main color left. The instructions on how to do the pleats were actually really good, which made the sewing relatively fast as well.

Finished object:

The colors aren't the most accurate in this picture, the main fabric color is actually more of a light lime greenish shade.

Did I like the pattern? Yes, it was well written, with a good number of pictures to show what you were supposed to be doing. The instructions for attaching the ties were a little confusing, but once I actually read the instructions instead of skimming them, I figured it out.

Would I make it again? Yeah, for sure!
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Check out Erin's post about this week's Tuesday Knitting Night! The crowd was huge this week, I can't believe so many people were there. I think the muggles at the coffee shop were a bit stunned :)